Oh, the adventurous child! Pushing the limits . . . coloring outside the lines . . . challenging the rules . . . extreme tears . . . extreme laughter. The parental gasp is filled with fear, anger, shock, and gratitude all at the same time. And as much as we love them, we need to lead them with purpose and authority. With our leadership, we can release the parental control and launch our children into responsibility.
Leadership has its challenges. Our different personalities can lead to clashes of the will. That isn’t to say that conflict resolution is easier when you and your child are too much the same. It is typically these two extremes (too different, too similar) that can make everyone dig their heels into the ground. So how do we access our children and tap into their hearts? One way to look at it is to lead with our senses. Each of us tend to favor one of our visual, auditory, or kinesthetic senses. Examine yourself and study your child. Determine how you can use those strengths to compliment each other. Instead of arguing over who is doing it right/better, be united and play to your strengths because each person has an “access system” to connect with their soul and a “lead system” to express their soul.
Leading and Accessing With Our Senses
Are You Visual?
- Pleased with visual order
- Tend to be organized
- Understand the world by looking at it
- Would rather read / be on a screen
- Remember more when visuals are used
Are You Auditory?
- Do well with spoken language
- Sensitive to tones/sounds (feels like everyone is screaming/fighting)
- Like to make noise when bored
- Like music
- Like to talk about things
- Understand the world by hearing/talking about it
- Say what she wants to remember
- React to all stimuli
Are You Kinesthetic?
- Learn more by doing
- Use body movement (point, gestures, . . .)
- Want to handle and examine things
- Touch more frequently
- Respond physically when listening
- Celebrate to touch & movement
- “Touchy-feely”
We need build appropriate fences around our adventurous children, but also give them the freedom to fail in order for them to grow up. Don’t be afraid to speak up and be the leader of your home. Sometimes we worry that our discipline will hurt our relationship. However, the discipline is the matter of leadership. We need to lead with our life (model asking for forgiveness), lead with our love (making affection the atmosphere of our home), lead with purpose (have a goal).
Practice these phrases:
You, I love . . . not the behavior.
You will get this! I have faith in you!
I know you will figure it out.
With these words, we build confidence in our adventurous child and motivate him by coming through their sensory “front door” to connect with him and create a relationship of mutual respect.